Blum’s Coffee Crunch Cake

Helen Kane

Since receiving this recipe 16 years ago, I have purchased Love To Bake Pastry Cookbook by Ernest Weil, the founder of Fantasia Confections in San Francisco, and the creator of the original Blum’s Coffee Crunch Cake back in the 1940’s!

Blum’s was an institution in San Francisco – it was where mothers brought their daughters – dressed in their Mary Janes and gloves – and where blue-haired matrons held court over tea, and sumptuous desserts. I worked at the downtown Blum’s in 1966 – and it holds the distinction of being the very first job I was ever fired from… I got this recipe from Helen Kane who volunteered with me at Project Open Hand, April 1995.